Airlines Face Growing Pains

Occasional long lines at airports and crowded planes are causing glitches as the heavy summer travel season takes off, but the airline industry is viewing this year's problems as manageable.

Loads, or occupancy levels, of about 81% are only slightly ahead of the past two years, said US Airways (LCC Quote) Chief Executive Doug Parker, in an interview. "With higher load factors, service disruptions are harder to accommodate," Parker says. "That just makes it more important to run a good airline."

Clearly, this is not the summer of 2000, which marked the low point in the aviation system's ability to handle its passengers. Six years ago, timeliness was a problem because of a series of summer storms, the federal government's decision to allow more flights at New York's already congested LaGuardia Airport and pilots at UAL's (UAUA Quote) United Airlines, then the world's largest carrier, refusing to fly overtime.

That June, only 66% of flights arrived on time. For the full year, only 72.6% met their scheduled arrival time, according to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics. By contrast, 77% of flights were on time in 2005, and the pace was about the same through April of this year. ...